Every claims organization has a handbook. Procedures are documented. Protocols are established. Best practices are laminated and posted in break rooms. From a compliance standpoint, most operations have their bases covered. And yet, if you pulled ten random claim files from ten different organizations – all following the same state statutes, all subject to the…
Reform Fatigue: Why the Next Wave Has to Start With People, Not Process
If you’ve been in workers’ compensation long enough, you’ve developed a particular twitch. It activates whenever someone announces that comprehensive reform is coming to your state. Your eye starts to flutter. Your blood pressure ticks up. You begin mentally cataloging all the systems, forms, and procedures you’re about to relearn. Welcome to reform fatigue. It’s…
The Injured Worker Behind the Claim Number
There’s a moment in every workers’ compensation claim where a human being becomes a file number. It happens almost imperceptibly – somewhere between the first report of injury and the assignment to an adjuster’s caseload. One minute, Maria is a shipping clerk who slipped on a wet floor and is scared about how she’s going…
7,000 US Workers Will Get Hurt Today. A New Book Says There is a Better Way to Care for Them.
Note from Bob: My new book was released today! The following is the general press release that was issued announcing it. Thank You For Holding: Your Injury Is Important To Us blends humor and hard truth to make the case that America’s century-old workplace injury system must stop managing claims and start restoring lives. LAKEWOOD…
The Brilliance of Stupidity
I’ve been thinking quite a bit about stupidity lately. More specifically, I’ve been thinking about developing an entire conference session presenting an analysis on the economic benefits of stupidity. Now, I must explain that I am not talking about stupid people per se, but rather non-stupid people who may occasionally do stupid things. And, of…
Where I’ve Been: Writing About What’s Possible
Several people have asked me recently why I haven’t been writing as much this year on Bob’s Cluttered Desk. The short answer is: I’ve been writing. Just not here. For the past several months, I’ve been working on something I’ve wanted to write for quite some time—a book about an idea I’ve been championing since…
WCRI – When Hospitals Close, Workers Drive Farther — But the Cost Story Isn’t What You’d Expect
When a hospital closes, the intuitive assumption is that everything gets worse — longer drives, delayed treatment, higher medical costs, extended disability. New research from the Workers’ Compensation Research Institute suggests the reality is more nuanced than that, and the findings carry important implications for employers, carriers, and injured workers in communities losing access to…
Work Requirements, Claim Shifting, and the GLP-1 Reckoning: Sommers Fields Questions at WCRI
Q&A Session Following the Opening Keynote at the 2026 WCRI Issues and Research Conference Following his opening keynote at the 2026 Workers’ Compensation Research Institute Issues and Research Conference, Harvard health economist Dr. Benjamin Sommers sat down with WCRI CEO Ramona Tanabe for an extended Q&A session that drew pointed questions from the audience. If…
WCRI – Health Coverage in Flux: Harvard Economist Warns Workers’ Comp Industry to Brace for Fallout from Federal Policy Shifts
The workers’ compensation industry may soon feel the reverberations of sweeping changes to America’s health insurance landscape, according to Dr. Benjamin Sommers, who delivered the opening keynote address at the 2026 Workers’ Compensation Research Institute (WCRI) Issues and Research Conference here in Boston today. Dr. Sommers, the Huntley Quelch Professor of Health Care Economics at…
The Robot Learning Curve: What 1,000 Tasks in One Day Means for Workers’ Comp (Spoiler: We’re Not Ready)
I’ve been watching the robotics news with the kind of morbid fascination usually reserved for horror movies where you know the ending won’t be good but you can’t look away. The latest development? Researchers have taught a robot to learn 1,000 different physical tasks in a single day using just one demonstration per task. One day. One…